Sunday marked yet another black day for fundamental rights in India. Though these charter of rights are enshrined in our constituion, my experience on Sunday morning at the Delhi airport show that these are not equally accessible to all citizens.

Early morning on January 11th 2015, I was to leave for London to address a British Parliamentary panel of the effects a London-based British company has on forest communities and regions in India. I was stopped at immigration, my baggage was de-planed, the immigration officer claimed that this was being done on the orders of Government of India, and my passport was stamped with the word "offload". No further reason was given. On a day that several Heads of State, millions of people representing every possible cross section of society, marched for Fr... Read more >

It looks like the Government’s plans to open up New Zealand’s deep and clean oceans to dangerous deepwater drilling could be in deep trouble.

Today’s Herald reports that plunging global oil prices have forced explorers to scale back plans in New Zealand. This is not breaking news as such, as the price of oil has been collapsing over the last six months, but we are now starting to see what this actually means for the oil industry. And it’s bad news for them and the Government.

With oil now below $50 a barrel, plans for drilling in risky areas like the Arctic and off our coastlines are looking shakier than the Wellington fault line. The thing is, not only is deepwater drilling dangerous, it’s also very, very expensive. And oil giants looking to drill in New Zealand, like Anadarko and Statoi...

As a country with so much invested in high-tech export earnings, Korea’s out-of-control distant water fishing industry must be starting to give its politicians and business leaders ulcers. The Oyang 75 sitting in Montevideo, Uruguay, after fishing just beyond the border of Argentinean waters, demands international attention.

I've just returned from seven days on board SV Vega as part of a small team monitoring the impacts of seismic testing on marine mammals off the west coast of Northland. No research has been done in this area, so I jumped at the chance to be involved.

We left from Houhora and rounded Cape Reinga. It took us an entire day to get out to the survey site and on the way our first mate Nick showed me how to steer the boat, which was important because we all had to take turns doing this during the trip. Twice on the way, we had dolphins come up and swim along side the boat. The next time we saw dolphins, we had hydrophones in the water recording close to where the Aquila Explorer was doing its seismic testing for Statoil.

Statoil has seen a lot of Greenpeace this week but so far its staying schtum in response to New Zealanders calling on it to ‘go home’.

However, that deafening silence does not extend to the deep waters off the Northland coast right at the moment.

Statoil has started its search for oil, about 120 west of Cape Reinga, using noisy seismic testing. Evidence from marine scientists around the world suggests that seismic testing is bad for whales and dolphins.

Seismic testing is the first step of oil exploration. Before the oil rigs even arrive, before the drills go in the seabed, companies must first determine where to find the oil, if there is any. The process is done from a ship firing off repeated sound blasts day and night sometimes over weeks or months. The blasts, created by underwater... Read more >

This morning Greenpeace activists barricaded shut Statoil’s new Wellington office before the Norwegian oil giant has fully opened for business.

And the reason: to send a very clear message to Norway that New Zealanders don’t want Statoil here drilling for deep sea oil, putting our environment and economy at risk.

Activists blocked the entry by adding extra locks to the front door and boarding it up with planks and a sign reading ‘Go Home Statoil’. The sign, featuring Maori motifs, was designed by members of Northland iwi that are opposed to deep sea oil exploration off their coast.

Today’s action comes a day after Energy and Resources minister Simon Bridges opened up vast new areas of our ocean (including maui’s dolphin habitat) and forest parks to oil drilling. Statoil has picked up... Read more >

Shell and its allies cannot be trusted to drill in the Arctic. Their reputation took another hammering last night when Noble Drilling, Shell’s sub-contractor, plead guilty to a staggering eight felony charges relating to environmental and safety violations on board the vessels Noble Discoverer and Kulluk (which it operated on behalf of Shell) in the Alaskan Arctic in 2012. Noble will pay a $12.2m fine, has been placed on probation for four years and must upgrade all of its plans to meet safety and environmental protection requirements.

This really is bad news for Shell as it gears up for another crack at the Arctic next summer. Pretty much everything that could go wrong in 2012 did go wrong, and this is yet more evidence that Shell is simply not up to the challenge of operating in ...